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You may need to switch brands of soap if you find that mosquitoes are biting too much.
If you go to bed every night after showering and washing with soapyou probably understand why mosquitoes have been biting you so much lately.
And it is that unlike what you may think, when you wash with soap, you are getting rid of body odor, but on the other hand you are offering the mosquitoes a much sweeter scent thanks to the soap, and that’s why maybe they itch so much at night.
And now a new study explains that some soapy fragrances could become a bigger target for mosquitoes.
They comment that mosquitoes may be attracted to soap because when they feed on blood, they supplement their sugar intake with plant nectars.
“The fact that we are taking those floral and fruity smells and putting them on our bodies means that now the same object smells like a flower and a person at the same time.“, said Clement Vinaugerfrom the University of Virginia Polytechnic Institute. “It would be like waking up and smelling something that was both coffee and muffins. Very attractive”.
Of course, they clarify that the effect of the flavors differs between people, basically because each of them has a unique odor profile.
“It is remarkable that the same individual that is extremely attractive to mosquitoes when not washed can be made even more attractive to mosquitoes with one soap and then made repellent or repulsive to mosquitoes with another soap.“, Add.
That was the experiment
For the experiment published in the iScience magazine, they recruited four volunteers who had to send fabric samples that they had used as a sleeve with four different brands of soap including Dial, Dove, Native and Simple Truth.
They found that mosquitoes landed on some fabric samples more than others, so the choice of soap has a lot to do with who they bite.
Specifically, garments that had been washed with Dial, Dove, and Simple Truth increased their attractiveness to mosquitoes, while garments with Native soap tended to repel mosquitoes.
This is because Native soap is coconut-scented, and the scientists clarify that there is some evidence that coconut oil is a natural deterrent to mosquitoes.
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